How to get started with Object Storage: Create your first bucket

Most ML/AI workloads involve large files, such as datasets and artifacts of trained models. To efficiently store, access and share them, you can use Object Storage, a simple storage service offered by Nebius AI Cloud. In this guide, you will learn how to start using Object Storage. You will set up your environment to work with Object Storage, create your first bucket, a data container and upload a test file. For visual guidance on creating a bucket and uploading objects in the web console, watch the video below. If you prefer other interfaces or written instructions, follow the steps further down.

Visit Nebius Academy for video tutorials to help you get started with Nebius AI Cloud.

Prepare your environment

Make sure that you meet the prerequisites for your preferred interface:

Web console
Nebius AI Cloud CLI

Make sure you are in a group that has the admin role within your tenant or project; for example, the default admins group. You can check this in the Administration → IAM section of the web console.In this guide, you will use the terminal in your environment, for example on your local machine, to run commands that create and manage Nebius AI Cloud resources. The commands use certain command line interfaces (CLIs) and tools that you need to install first. Here are all the installation commands in a single copy-and-paste block:

sudo apt-get install unzip jq
curl "https://awscli.amazonaws.com/awscli-exe-linux-x86_64.zip" -o "awscliv2.zip"
unzip awscliv2.zip
sudo ./aws/install
curl -sSL https://storage.eu-north1.nebius.cloud/cli/install.sh | bash
nebius profile create

brew install jq
curl "https://awscli.amazonaws.com/AWSCLIV2.pkg" -o "AWSCLIV2.pkg"
sudo installer -pkg AWSCLIV2.pkg -target /
curl -sSL https://storage.eu-north1.nebius.cloud/cli/install.sh | bash
nebius profile create

These commands will install the following:

AWS CLI (how to install) manages buckets and objects: Object Storage is compatible with Amazon S3. For Linux, the AWS CLI is distributed in a ZIP archive, so the commands also install the unzip package.
jq (how to install) parses JSON outputs from the Nebius AI Cloud CLI and extracts resource IDs for other commands.
Nebius AI Cloud CLI (how to install) manages all Nebius AI Cloud resources. In this guide, the CLI is used to create access-related resources. It can also be used for creating and modifying Object Storage buckets, but not for uploading objects.

The last command, nebius profile create, will guide you through several prompts. After you complete the prompts, your browser will open the Nebius AI Cloud web console sign-in screen. Sign in to the web console to complete the initialization. If you have access to multiple tenants, the CLI will prompt you to choose a tenant ID. After that, save your project ID in the CLI configuration:If the project ID has not been configured during the nebius profile create flow, get the project ID and save it in the CLI configuration:

nebius config set parent-id <project_ID>

Configure access, credentials and AWS CLI settings

If you are using the web console, you can skip this step and proceed to creating a bucket.

Create a service account and save its ID to an environment variable:

export SA_ID=$(nebius iam service-account create \
  --name object-storage-sa --format json \
  | jq -r '.metadata.id')

Grant edit access to the service account:

Get the tenant ID:

export PROJECT_ID=$(nebius config get parent-id)
export TENANT_ID=$(nebius iam project get $PROJECT_ID --format jsonpath='{.metadata.parent_id}')

Get the ID of the default editors group:

export EDITORS_GROUP_ID=$(nebius iam group get-by-name \
  --name editors --parent-id $TENANT_ID \
  --format jsonpath='{.metadata.id}')

Add the service account to editors group:

nebius iam group-membership create \
  --parent-id $EDITORS_GROUP_ID \
  --member-id $SA_ID

Create an access key for the service account and get its AWS-like ID and contents:

export ACCESS_KEY_ID=$(nebius iam access-key create \
  --account-service-account-id $SA_ID \
  --description 'AWS CLI' \
  --format json | jq -r '.resource_id')
export ACCESS_KEY_AWS_ID=$(nebius iam access-key get-by-id \
  --id $ACCESS_KEY_ID \
  --format json | jq -r '.status.aws_access_key_id')
export SECRET_ACCESS_KEY=$(nebius iam access-key get-secret-once \
  --id $ACCESS_KEY_ID --format json \
  | jq -r '.secret')

Add the key to the AWS CLI configuration:

aws configure set aws_access_key_id $ACCESS_KEY_AWS_ID
aws configure set aws_secret_access_key $SECRET_ACCESS_KEY

Depending on your project region, add the Nebius AI Cloud region ID and the Object Storage endpoint URL to the AWS CLI configuration:

aws configure set region <region_ID>
aws configure set endpoint_url https://storage.<region_ID>.nebius.cloud

For example, run the following commands for a project in eu-north1:

aws configure set region eu-north1
aws configure set endpoint_url https://storage.eu-north1.nebius.cloud

Create a bucket and upload a file to it

In Object Storage, a bucket is a container for objects. An object, in turn, is a file together with its metadata such as the file name (it is called object key in Object Storage terms). You can use the web console or the AWS CLI to create buckets and upload objects.

Web console
AWS CLI

Create a bucket:
1. In the sidebar, go to Storage → Object Storage.
2. Click Create bucket.
3. (Optional) Specify the bucket name. The bucket name must be unique across the region. For more information, see Naming.
4. Set the bucket parameters.
5. Click Create bucket.
Upload a file:
1. Click Add → Object.
2. In the window that opens, select the file to upload.
3. Click Upload.
Check that the Objects tab shows the new object.

Create a bucket:
aws s3 mb s3://quickstart-bucket

Upload an object:

echo 'Hello world!' > test.txt
aws s3 cp test.txt s3://quickstart-bucket/test.txt

To make sure that the object has been uploaded, list the objects in the bucket:
aws s3 ls s3://quickstart-bucket

Object Storage

Managed Service for PostgreSQL®

Container Registry

How to get started with Object Storage: Create your first bucket

Prepare your environment

Configure access, credentials and AWS CLI settings

Create a bucket and upload a file to it

​Prepare your environment

​Configure access, credentials and AWS CLI settings

​Create a bucket and upload a file to it

Prepare your environment

Configure access, credentials and AWS CLI settings

Create a bucket and upload a file to it